HMD has never changed the BR of any aircraft.
And yes the gunpod notably impacts the flight performance:
In comparison, the new cannon on RMV is 15.6% the mass and half the drag.
The RMV also allows you to bring the drop tank with a gun so you can run lower internal fuel.
It changed the M2KD’s BR.
No, it doesn’t. Your own screenshot confirms only a 40 kg/f drag difference which is nothing.
Not really, the engines that the FGR2 and FG1 get offer slightly better acceleration, while they are forced to trade for HMD and longer range missiles that can also pull off the rails immediately. This is also not considering the leading edge slats the F4S has which offers better maneuverability, as well as how the gunpod both the US F4J and F4S have both weighs less and has less drag than the gun pod the UK phantoms have to use. The gunpod in general really negates that engine advantage that the UK phantoms have.
The only time the UK phantoms except for the UK F4J have better flight performance is if they don’t run the gunpod, which is not a viable option due to its missile kit.
You can not be telling me with a straight face that the UK phantoms are somehow better or at the same level as the US F4J and F4S, the Mirage F1C, and the Mig 23 ML series.
I did not know this, and now knowing this at least gives the FGR.2 and FG.1 more options.
In this case, both should get Skyflash supetemps and stay at 12.0br, but the FGR.2 should get Aim 9Ls and go to 12.3br.
I agree there are other aircraft that are undertiered like the F5E, F18A, Mig 21bis and such, however BRs are also so compressed that other aircraft can’t be moved up such as the Ja37C or the Mig 23 MLs. Knowing Gaijin, BR decompression is pretty unlikely to happen, and if you were to compare the UK phantoms to other 12.0br aircraft, they are clearly inferior and don’t have the capabilities to stay at 12.0br.
Which is why I clearly stated that 11.3br is just for the UK F4J as again, they have none of the advantages of the US F4J and get none of the advnatages of the FGR.2 and FG.1. The FGR.2 and FG.1 should be 11.7br due to the slightly better engines in comparison to the UK F4J.
Also if you were to even do a comparison of UK F4J to the viggen or the US/Isreali F4E, they are practically equals.
UK F4J vs Ja37C Viggen
Viggen gets large counter measures, a better radar, better maneuverability, better thrust to weight, internal gun and better flight performance in general. The UK F4J gets more missiles, better IR missiles, more ammo, better RWR and better energy retention.
UK F4J vs US/Isreali F4E
UK Phantom gets a PD radar, better IR missiles when compared to US F4E (Isreali F4E gets the same IR missiles), and more ammo. Meanwhile US/Isreali F4E gets better flight performance, better maneuverability due to agile eagle upgrade, gets more flares with large countermeasures, better RWR and an internal gun.
Leading edge slats are the other reason why the F-4J bleeds more speed than the F-4FG1.
Both F-4FG1 and F-4J are limited to the same G-loads, so that leading edge isn’t going to help much at high speeds, but at mid speeds it’ll start bleeding even more speed.
F-4FG1 is to F-4J what F-16AJ is to F-20. F-20 is primarily a lower BR because of its flight performance difference despite having a similar loadout.
F-4J/S requires a gunpod as well… you know that right?
F-4FG1 is obviously superior to Mig-23ML. Vastly superior radar, similarly performing radar missiles, and sidegrade IR missiles. F-1C is obviously an IR missile only plane, as its radar missiles are dogwater, while having worse flight performance. If F-1C didn’t have Magic 2s carrying it at 12.0, it’d be 11.3 in a nanosecond, potentially 11.0.
Not to mention the only time the UK Phantoms have a significant advantage in the engine department is in downtiers because even in 0.3br uptiers you can face the F-16 or M2K and both of these are much faster than you are generally and will rinse you in any sort of engagement.
The UK phantoms are definitely at least on the level of the MiG-23 and Mirage F1 though.
